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Note: Please let me know if you ever decide you would rather not to continue receiving these messages. I realize viewing something that may be difficult to understand might not be very encouraging, so I don’t want to chance confusing anyone. Thanks and God bless. -NC
There is often only occupation with Christ for the relief of the conscience, and if so, where does it stop? It stops when the relief is met. But if He is the Object of the heart, you will never be satisfied but in association and fellowship with Him where He is. If there is simple occupation with Christ, you cannot enjoy it but in association with Him where He is, and in communion with Him about things here. In Psalm 23, there is lying down first, and then I come forth refreshed for the responsibilities of life here, and to walk in “the paths of righteousness.” I “fear no evil.”
I must first know Him where He is; if I do not know Him where He is, I shall not rest in Him for my life down here. True, He accomplished everything down here, but you never get satisfied rest in your soul until you know that the Father has glorified Him up there. You never find a truly restful soul who does not raise the question—where is He? Mary Magdalene says, “They have taken my Lord” (Jhn 20:13). The two disciples in John 1 asked, “Where dwellest thou” (Jhn 1:38). The heart is set on the discovery of where He is. It is vain for a man to tell me his heart is on a person, if he is indifferent as to where that person is. “If you then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth” (Col 3:1).
I stand on simple grace. I am entitled to nothing, but I count on what is in my Father’s heart for me. When I come to discover what is in that heart for me, that is grace. It is an unspeakable comfort to my heart to say I know He will do something, though what He will do I know not. I would not venture to dictate to Him what He should do, but I know my Father’s heart.
The Lord says to me, if you come to Me, you will find My Word working in you to remove the shade of reserve that has come between you and Me; the first great desire of My heart is that there shall be nothing between you and Me. I will make it My business that there shall be no break in our intimacy (there’s never a time when we are not “forgiven”—NC). He wiped the disciple’s feet after He had washed them; the towel is to give the soul the sense that there is nothing between, nothing of defilement left.
The moment I begin to walk in His path (1Jo 2:6 – concerned only of the Father’s will—NC), I find out all my contrarieties. For the right road there are ninety-nine roads wrong, and the heart is ever inclined to go up one of those roads. When it does, the Lord says, I will send My Word after you and draw you out of it. The washing of my feet sets me free from the wrong road, and, the moment I get on the right one, I have the confirmed sense from the Lord Himself—I am with you, I bear you company.
If I am not aware that the Lord sympathizes with me, that He is looking after my concerns, I cannot turn around and think of His affairs. But if I have the sympathy of the Lord Jesus I shall not be worried (John 14:1, 27), I know that He is thinking about me and my affairs, and I leave them all to Him (Mat 11:28).
—J B Stoney
MJS daily devotional excerpt for November 20
“It takes us a long time to realize that all is darkness outside the Light of heaven and earth.” -MJS
“The moment we begin to rest our peace on anything in ourselves, we lose it. And this is why so many saints have not settled peace. How can you have settled peace? Only by having it in the Father’s way. By not resting on anything, even the Spirit’s work within, but on what the Lord Jesus has done entirely outside you.
“Then you will know peace—conscious unworthiness, but yet peace. In the Lord Jesus alone, the Father finds that in which He rests; and so it is with His saints. The more you see the extent and nature of the evil that is within, as well as that without and around, the more you will find that what the Lord Jesus is and did, is the only ground at all on which you can rest.”
“When the eye is turned away from the Lord Jesus, darkness must set in. It is only as the eye is single that the body is full of light. And what is a single eye but having Him for our Object? It is thus that light divine pours in upon us, until every chamber of our moral being becomes lighted up, and we become light for others. In this way the believer is kept happily free from obscurity, perplexity, and anxiety. He finds all his springs in the Lord Jesus.”
“It is having the Lord Jesus as our Object which alone gives us the power of truth. When we have anything of our own as an object, so far we slip aside, for the Lord Jesus alone is the full truth. It is only in proportion as we are filled with Him, and have Him to the exclusion of our own evil, that we ourselves walk in the truth. Let us have our hearts fixed on any one thing or person save the One who is our life, and evil results.” William Kelly (1821-1906)
Clear Communion
There is often only occupation with Christ for the relief of the conscience, and if so, where does it stop? It stops when the relief is met. But if He is the Object of the heart, you will never be satisfied but in association and fellowship with Him where He is. If there is simple occupation with Christ, you cannot enjoy it but in association with Him where He is, and in communion with Him about things here. In Psalm 23, there is lying down first, and then I come forth refreshed for the responsibilities of life here, and to walk in “the paths of righteousness.” I “fear no evil.”
I must first know Him where He is; if I do not know Him where He is, I shall not rest in Him for my life down here. True, He accomplished everything down here, but you never get satisfied rest in your soul until you know that the Father has glorified Him up there. You never find a truly restful soul who does not raise the question—where is He? Mary Magdalene says, “They have taken my Lord” (Jhn 20:13). The two disciples in John 1 asked, “Where dwellest thou” (Jhn 1:38). The heart is set on the discovery of where He is. It is vain for a man to tell me his heart is on a person, if he is indifferent as to where that person is. “If you then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth” (Col 3:1).
I stand on simple grace. I am entitled to nothing, but I count on what is in my Father’s heart for me. When I come to discover what is in that heart for me, that is grace. It is an unspeakable comfort to my heart to say I know He will do something, though what He will do I know not. I would not venture to dictate to Him what He should do, but I know my Father’s heart.
The Lord says to me, if you come to Me, you will find My Word working in you to remove the shade of reserve that has come between you and Me; the first great desire of My heart is that there shall be nothing between you and Me. I will make it My business that there shall be no break in our intimacy (there’s never a time when we are not “forgiven”—NC). He wiped the disciple’s feet after He had washed them; the towel is to give the soul the sense that there is nothing between, nothing of defilement left.
The moment I begin to walk in His path (1Jo 2:6 – concerned only of the Father’s will—NC), I find out all my contrarieties. For the right road there are ninety-nine roads wrong, and the heart is ever inclined to go up one of those roads. When it does, the Lord says, I will send My Word after you and draw you out of it. The washing of my feet sets me free from the wrong road, and, the moment I get on the right one, I have the confirmed sense from the Lord Himself—I am with you, I bear you company.
If I am not aware that the Lord sympathizes with me, that He is looking after my concerns, I cannot turn around and think of His affairs. But if I have the sympathy of the Lord Jesus I shall not be worried (John 14:1, 27), I know that He is thinking about me and my affairs, and I leave them all to Him (Mat 11:28).
—J B Stoney
MJS daily devotional excerpt for November 20
“It takes us a long time to realize that all is darkness outside the Light of heaven and earth.” -MJS
“The moment we begin to rest our peace on anything in ourselves, we lose it. And this is why so many saints have not settled peace. How can you have settled peace? Only by having it in the Father’s way. By not resting on anything, even the Spirit’s work within, but on what the Lord Jesus has done entirely outside you.
“Then you will know peace—conscious unworthiness, but yet peace. In the Lord Jesus alone, the Father finds that in which He rests; and so it is with His saints. The more you see the extent and nature of the evil that is within, as well as that without and around, the more you will find that what the Lord Jesus is and did, is the only ground at all on which you can rest.”
“When the eye is turned away from the Lord Jesus, darkness must set in. It is only as the eye is single that the body is full of light. And what is a single eye but having Him for our Object? It is thus that light divine pours in upon us, until every chamber of our moral being becomes lighted up, and we become light for others. In this way the believer is kept happily free from obscurity, perplexity, and anxiety. He finds all his springs in the Lord Jesus.”
“It is having the Lord Jesus as our Object which alone gives us the power of truth. When we have anything of our own as an object, so far we slip aside, for the Lord Jesus alone is the full truth. It is only in proportion as we are filled with Him, and have Him to the exclusion of our own evil, that we ourselves walk in the truth. Let us have our hearts fixed on any one thing or person save the One who is our life, and evil results.” William Kelly (1821-1906)
